Monday, August 09, 2010

One would think that after being embroiled in a scandal that rocked Florida, the religious right, and his gubernatorial aspirations, Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum would change his negative opinion of gay adoption, the very reason for the scandal.

MCCOLLUM: I don’t believe in gay adoption. I don’t believe in involving the government in enforcing or encouraging the lifestyle of gays and homosexuals. I just don’t believe that. [...]

Q: Florida permits homosexuals to serve as foster parents. That has been used as an argument to undermine the ban on adoptions. Should homosexuals be permitted to serve as foster parents in Florida?

MCCOLLUM: Well, I personally don’t think so, but that is the law.
Q: Should the law be changed?

MCCOLLUM: I think that it would be advisable. I really do not think that we should have homosexuals guiding our children. I think that it’s a lifestyle that I don’t agree with. I realize a lot of people do. It’s my personal faith, religious faith, that I don’t believe that the people who do this should be raising our children. It’s not a natural thing. You need a mother and a father. You need a man and a woman. That’s what God intended.

And here I thought God always commanded us to stand for truth. I guess I didn't get the memo McCollum received.

But we now see the reason why McCollum pushed in fighting for Florida's ban against gay adoption in spite of the fact that his office at first couldn't find any "experts" to speak on their side,

and the reason why George Rekers was the "expert" chosen in spite of the fact that McCollum's staff warned him that Rekers had credibility problems,

and the reason why McCollum is still pushing against gay adoption even after his case was soundly defeated in court and his office frittered away over $100,000 dollars to Rekers.

That reason being - McCollum's personal beliefs tells him that gay adoption is wrong. Never mind being destroyed in court and never mind the all of the research which demonstrates his position to be wrong because those things don't matter.

Facts and truth don't matter to McCollum. Just his personal pseudo-Christian beliefs.

Maybe it's just me but I don't think that this is right. I don't think that a politician has a right to waste money and discriminate against people simply because of his personal beliefs (and I underline that part about "personal beliefs" because again, nothing concrete backs up McCollum's stance that gay adoption is dangerous or wrong.)

But something must be noted here and needs to be the topic of discussions that go beyond blogs.

In two cases (this one and the case of Proposition 8), we are seeing the dangers of people sacrificing truth for personal beliefs.

In the case of Proposition 8, when the reality that same sex marriage is harmless wasn't to the liking of some folks, they manufactured a plethora of phony data to say that it was.

In this case in Florida, McCollum isn't manufacturing false data. He is doing much worse by saying "to hell with the data" and "to hell with reason and accuracy. Gay adoption is wrong because I think so."

When people can push phony data or push aside accurate data with a public assurance that they are doing so in God's name, I think there are bigger problems in this world than the so-called "homosexual agenda."

Very satisfying appearance by Prop 8 lawyer David Boies on Face the Nation yesterday as he took on the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins and destroyed him. I especially like when he said the following:

"In a court of law you've got to come in and you've got to support those opinions, you've got to stand up under oath and cross-examination. And what we saw at trial is that it's very easy for the people who want to deprive gay and lesbian citizens of the right to vote [sic] to make all sorts of statements and campaign literature, or in debates where they can't be cross-examined.

"But when they come into court and they have to support those opinions and they have to defend those opinions under oath and cross-examination, those opinions just melt away. And that's what happened here. There simply wasn't any evidence, there weren't any of those studies. There weren't any empirical studies. That's just made up. That's junk science. It's easy to say that on television. But a witness stand is a lonely place to lie. And when you come into court you can't do that.

"That's what we proved: We put fear and prejudice on trial, and fear and prejudice lost."

And that is why the religious right will eventually lose this so-called culture war. Their foundation is built on lies and all lies are sooner or later exposed as such.
Hat tip to Americablog.

About Me

Alvin McEwen is 46-year-old African-American gay man who resides in Columbia, SC.
McEwen's blog, Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, and writings have been mentioned by Americablog.com, Goodasyou.org, People for the American Way, PageOneQ.com, The Washington Post, Raw Story, The Advocate, Media Matters for America, Crooksandliars.com, Thinkprogress.org, Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish, Melissa Harris-Perry, The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, Newsweek, The Daily Beast, The Washington Blade, and Foxnews.com.
In addition, he is also a past contributor to Pam's House Blend,Justice For All, LGBTQ Nation, and Alternet.org. He is a present contributor to the Daily Kos and the Huffington Post,
He is the 2007 recipient of the Harriet Daniels Hancock Volunteer of the Year Award and the 2010 recipient of the Order of the Pink Palmetto from the SC Pride Movement as well as the 2009 recipient of the Audre Lorde/James Baldwin Civil Rights Activist Award from SC Black Pride. In addition, he is a three-time nominee of the Ed Madden Media Advocacy Award from SC Pride.